The BuzzFeed Book Club announced its July pick today, and it's a good one: The Atmospherians by Alex McElroy, a morbidly funny satire about a cult to rehabilitate bad men. (Check out the first chapter here.)
In the slightly off-kilter universe of the novel, Sasha Marcus, founder of a beloved women's wellness brand, is dealing with the aftermath of a dark scandal: After one of her trolls livestreams his suicide and blames her for it, she becomes the subject of op-eds and death threats, while crowds of angry men station themselves outside of her apartment. She’s lost her job, friends, followers, and all hope, until her eccentric childhood friend Dyson shows up with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: Together, they're going to start a cult. It's a brilliant send-up of a society run ragged by disingenuous influencers, toxic masculinity, commodified self-care, weaponized positivity, and performative "wokeness.”